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Friday, 28 March 2014

Surprisingly, this really is a 15 minute recipe. Just make sure you have the ingredients out – no chopping beforehand, no packets opened, all can be done within the time! And it’s really scrummy too!

I didn’t use lamb chops as I couldn’t find the ones with the ‘stick’ on the end to hold (!), so chose a rack of lamb instead, and cut them into chops myself. Obviously, very easy and incredibly tasty.

It’s a case of seasoning the lamb then popping it into a hot pan, turning every so often so it gets a good colour. Meanwhile, chop the veg for the lasagnetti. Jamie uses spring onions, asparagus, red chilli and cherry tomatoes. Pop those in pan with some olive oil to fry off. Chop a bunch of mint and add this and some crushed garlic to the vegetables. Squash a couple more garlic cloves and, along with some rosemary springs, add to the lamb chops. Cut the fresh lasagne sheets into strips then add to the pan with some water to cook through. Reduce the heat under the lamb then toss the chops with clear honey and balsamic vinegar. Leave to rest for a few minutes while you sprinkle some parmesan over the lasagnetti, then serve everything. I poured the lasagnetti into a large bowl and the chops onto a plate so everyone could dig in a help themselves!

Friday, 21 March 2014

Ok, I admit it: my pancake day was a disaster. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever had a successful one. It’s not the pancakes, they seem to turn out well every time. It’s just the combination of being in a rush, never having quite the right ingredients for the topping and not thinking ahead. It sort of creeps up on me every year and I ‘make do’. This year, we happened to have some ready-made ones in the fridge, so I thought I’d top them with tartiflette for main course, then we could have Nutella for pudding. Quick and easy. Wrong.
For a start, I didn’t have any cream, or anything resembling yummy stuff, so used yoghurt – the no-fat, very healthy one – which, or course, I knew would curdle, and did. Ignoring that, I continued, heating the pancakes and spooning the mixture on top. However, once I had taken the first bite, I realised that the ready-made, oh-so-quick pancakes I had used were of the sweet, rather than savoury, variety. Not a good combination.
I skipped mains and went straight to dessert. Surely I couldn’t go wrong? Well, no, not technically. Mine were delicious, but the LO just didn’t like the pancakes, opting instead to simply lick the Nutella from the top.
So today, I had promised myself I would give things another go, if only to use my new Oxo ‘Flip and Fold’ omelette turner I had been sent to try for this purpose! Keeping things simple, I wanted to see if my LO would actually eat homemade pancakes, rather than shop-bought, and not simply scoff the chocolate! I always use Delia’s simple recipe.
After pouring the mixture into the small frying pan, I swirled it around a bit to spread it evenly, then when the edges began to crispen, used the thin edge of the flipper to loosen. Being quite a big flipper and quite a small pan, it worked really well to get under the pancake itself, and turned it easily without losing any of the mixture or crumpling the pancake. I had to wipe it clean if any mixture did get caught, as it then continued to stick, but this happened rarely. It was also brilliant for scraping all the mixture from the bowl so I wouldn’t waste any.
And the result? Perfect pancakes that even my LO approved of and ate! Hurrah!

Saturday, 8 March 2014

For Christmas, the LO received a cooking set including all the things she might need in the kitchen! It wasn’t a shop bought one, but one put together from various places that combined baking equipment, such as bun cases and mixing bowls, with savoury meal needs, like a chopping board or small saucepan. It is something we use together at least once a week, whether to make Mini-slider burgers, tiffin, or something more adventurous, like this Ella’s Kitchen cookbook Beef stew. It appeals to the LOs as it’s filled with sweet fruit and vegetables, but makes a brilliant family meal everyone can enjoy. We served ours with Yorkshire puddings, greens, and mustard mash.

For very little ones, it does involve much chopping of hard vegetables, but I still involved Frankie by asking her to find the right vegetables, count out the carrots, pop the pieces into the bowl after chopping, etc. And she enjoyed stirring everything together too. You could even put aside a little of everything for the LOs to ‘play’ with while you’re doing all the hard work, and if they munch on a little piece of raw carrot, so much the better! When it comes to spooning out the plum jam, I used jelly as we had some leftover from the last batch, it’s easy to get them involved again.

Ella’s Kitchen – Wonderfully Warming Fruit Beef Stew

Ingredients:

2 tbs olive oil

750g diced stewing beef

1 onion

300g carrots, sliced

2 plums or apricots, stoned nad sliced

1 clove garlic

1tbs tomato puree

2 tbs plain flour

finely grated rind of 1 lemon, plus 1tbs of the juice

750ml beef stock

150g plum or damson jam

ground black pepper

Method:

Preheat oven to 160 degrees. In a large casserole, batch fry the beef in the oil until browned on all sides. Remove.

Cook onion in the same casserole for 2 minutes until softened. Add carrots, plums or apricots, garlic, tomato puree and flour, and cook for a further 2 minutes.

Return the beef and juices to the casserole, add the lemon rind and juice, beef stock, and jam. Season with the pepper and simmer.

Cover and cook in the oven for 2 hours until the beef is tender.

I used a ‘pre-chopped’ pack of stewing beef, but it was still dry when cooked because it had no fat on it. Next time, I will definitely buy a cheap cut of beef and chop it myself and it’s the melting fat that helps keep the beef pieces moist and fall apart wen cooked.

I apologise for the pictures on this post, but we’d already dug in to the meal before I remembered!

This recipe is taken from ‘Ella’s Kitchen. The Cook Book, The Red One.

Saturday, 1 March 2014

For some reason, we’ve always strayed away from the burger option on children’s menus, but, having thought more about it, surely they’re just the same as lasagne or cottage pie? Healthier in fact as not every little piece of mince is browned in fat first? Ok, so I’m not sure of the science behind that last comment, but it makes sense to me!

When asking Frankie if she wanted to make burgers for tea she, as is her first response to most things, declared that she didn’t like them. That was beside the point, and we began anyway! This is a great way to get the little ones involved in cooking as they can get their hands in to mix, measure out spoonfuls of spices, squash them in the pestle and mortar and help break the eggs and crumble the bread – it’ll keep them occupied for hours!

I’ve always based my mince mix on Jamie Oliver’s ‘Botham Burgers’ as they’re really tasty. If you read my blog regularly, you’ll know I tend not to ‘do’ quantities as, with things like this, you adapt to your own tastes. I’ll try and put a few suggestions in, but it’s really up to you and your family what flavours and spicing you prefer. Here’s my version:

Ingredients:

small pack of lean mince

1 large tablespoons coriander seeds

1 desert spoon cumin seeds

a few grinds of black pepper

1 egg

1 slice of bread, crumbed

1 red onion

1 large dollop Dijon mustard

Dice-sized cubes of Cheddar cheese – or blue cheese if you prefer

Method:

Ask your LO to tip the mince into the bowl and begin pulling it apart. Remind them not to put their fingers in their mouth!

Meanwhile, finely dice the onion. I shove mine in the food processor!

Once the mince is broken up, measure out the coriander, cumin and pepper and grind in a pestle and mortar. Again, the measuring and grinding is something your LO will enjoy helping with. When done, tip into the mince and get your hands in to combine. You could always add a few chilli flakes at this point too.

Use one slice of bread, doesn’t matter which colour, as breadcrumbs. I use a coffee grinder to do mine but your LO will have fun just pulling it apart. Add the crumbs, the egg, the onion and the dollop of mustard to the mix and combine well. Lots of hands in to squash and squeeze the mixture – combine everything well.

Now comes the fun bit! Take a good sized amount of the mixture and squash flat onto the surface. Pop a cube of cheese in the middle and wrap the mixture around it. Use cupped hands to shape it into a ball, then gently flatten to the desired thickness for your burger. Your LO will really enjoy ‘hiding’ the cheese inside when making her own mini burger, or slider.

To cook, simple brown on each side in a frying pan then put into the oven to finish the cooking. You can do it all in the oven if you’d prefer not to fry but you’ll lose some of the flavour from the browning process. It will depend on how thick your burgers are as to their cooking time, but I brown for a couple of minutes on each side, then finish off for about 10 minutes in the oven. You want the beef to be cooked through but still moist.

Now layer up your bun. I used a tiger roll or a soft one with a crisp top. For Frankie, We used small cookie cutters and pushed them through a soft roll to create a mini slider bun just the right size for little hands and tummies.

For the grown ups, I put salad leaves,cheese, tomato and red onion into the bun, then people added their own sauces. For Frankie, I left hers plain with a small squeeze of ketchup as a treat and made a ‘shake-me’ salad instead: chopped tomato, cucumber, pepper and onion in a tub which she can shake to mix, then pour onto her plate.

Frankie wolfed hers down, as did the rest of the family, and it’s perfect to keep your LOs occupied for an hour on a wet day. Don’t forget, there’ll be the extra surprise of the melted cheese too!

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Bon Appétit

As I sit here writing this, my boyfriend is asking what a 'blog' is and how I know about them, wondering what, exactly, I'm going to write about. So, Bon Appétit is a blog about food, drink, cooking and anything else I add in as I go! Similar to my recipes actually!
The Cabbage Patch means I can 'see how my garden grows' and is a vegetable diary! It's also a place I can add photos, thoughts and pictures of the cat that I can't file anywhere else!